groundviews » R2P: The Chinthanaya Version

R2P: The Chinthanaya Version

February 13, 2008 at 5:20 am · Categories: Media and Communications, Peace and Conflict, Politics and Governance | by Dr. P. Saravanamuttu

In recent weeks, the public at large has been treated to the unseemly saga of the sacking, reinstatement, cancellation of visa and departure from the island of the Executive Director, International Centre for Ethnic Studies, Colombo, Dr. Rama Mani.

What began as a internal problem of succession and transition within that organisation took on quite sensational and sordid proportions in the ways in which it was handled and in the way in which an internal problem within a premier and long standing civil society institution in this country of international repute, culminated in an alleged threat to national security associated with the concept of the Responsibility to Protect or R2P.

The internal problems of the ICES are not of concern here, except for the way in which they were dealt with, demonstrating the manifest incivility lurking in the bosom of what prides itself as the community of the sensitive. Be it greed or maladministration, it seems as if the prize of institutional capture has obscured the imperative of institutional salvation.

Those who agree with this observation – peer and partner alike – must surely communicate their distaste in no uncertain terms to all those embroiled; puppets and puppeteers, predators and prey.

The association and support for civil society strengthening, governance, peace and democracy, must not countenance the negation of all these values in a grubby power struggle. There was a lot of this that was nasty and low and there should be no hesitation in calling it such.

Of greater interest and concern though is the use of R2P to turn Dr. Mani into a national security threat, involving the CID in her case and an assurance from the Prime Minister in parliament that she would not be granted an extension of her visa.

Under Dr. Mani’s stewardship, the ICES was to be associated with the R2P Centre to be established in New York as a southern organisation committed to human rights protection, democracy and governance.

Dr Mani presided at the Neelan Tiruchelvam lecture given by Gareth Evans, the architect of R2P, in which Evans pointed out that Sri Lanka could, if human rights protection and humanitarian standards were not met and the situation in respect of them continued to deteriorate, become a case where R2P arguments could be applied.

The point though was that the international community was obliged to assist governments to ensure that such a situation did not arise in the first place. The Responsibility to Prevent preceded the Responsibility to Protect and certainly any right of intervention on humanitarian or other grounds.

Dr. Mani’s interest in associating herself and her institution with R2P, has been enough to lead the defence and security establishment into the firm belief that she should be banished from our shores. Hard evidence though of this has not been made public and probably never will. I suspect that this is because it does not exist beyond the paranoia of the current dispensation.

Or is this yet another instance where the visa has been used as a weapon, to rid our pure paradise isle of alternative perspectives to the militaristic, majoritarian Chinthanaya?

It seems that in this war against the absolute enemy, the visa is a weapon as effective as the Kfir. It takes out the hostile, the humanitarian and the humanist. We are in the throes of an island-wide purge and those who cannot be purged in toto, like the Tamil citizens of this island, will most likely be given additional documentation from that which they have to now carry, for their own “protection,” a la the most recent policy prescription from that homegrown outfit totally committed to R2P – the JHU!

All those who breathed a sigh of relief with Dr. Mani’s departure and chalked it up as yet another advance in the certain and imminent victory against terrorism, are silent when the local version of R2P has nothing to do with protection and everything to do with punishment ! From papers and more papers to be carried at all times to eviction to mass arrests and detention, R2P is thriving in Sri Lanka irrespective of the purported machinations of Dr. Mani.

And in a Chinthanaya celebration of diversity no doubt, there is another version of R2P and it is the protection of perpetrators of human rights violations, more commonly known as the culture of impunity.

What would augment our sovereignty more – kicking out Dr. Mani or a single indictment against a member of the security forces allegedly responsible for one of the egregious violations of human rights before the Commission of Inquiry (COI) and the Independent International Group of Eminent Persons (IIGEP)?

Or effective action against paramilitaries turned electoral allies on the issue of child conscription? Or indictments against the high and mighty of yesterday, on the basis of the Justice Shiranee Thilaka-wardene Report? That in particular, would be the acid test for the argument that indictments undermine the morale of the security forces.

We are being turned into a silly and vicious little country by silly and vicious little men. They are mean and dangerous and have no compunction in playing dirty.

When the LTTE killed Dr. Neelan Tiruchelvam, I had the honour of speaking at his funeral. I remember saying that those of us who count ourselves amongst the community of the sensitive have many miles to go before we can sleep.

It is ironic that this message has to be repeated, nay reiterated and reinforced, on the likely demise of the organisation he founded and led to international recognition. It is time now, for this message to be heeded.

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dj said,

February 13, 2008 @ 9:34 am

Solid article. Stories of a conspiracy to undermine national sovereignty have good cash value for our self-appointed national saviours, but when the dust settles the only plot that will be left is an all too familiar Sri Lankan story of petty jealousies, thuggery and false petitions.

If the recent interview with one of the main protagonists in the past weekend’s The Nation is anything to go by, there is now a conscious attempt to shift the agenda to discussion of altogether more purely “professional” issues – re the financial predicament of the ICES, its internal structure etc…Dr. Sara’s piece has the virtue of reminding us what this all really about. The calling in of the CID and the cancellation of Dr Mani’s visa were not merely collateral.

Two further points.
As I understand it, the ICES association with the GCR2P was for the purposes of research, debate and discussion of the concept of R2P, ie critical intellectual scrutiny. So this is an issue of the policing of intellectual space and freedom. It is the very possibility of such critical intellectual activity that has been undermined from “within” as it were by those who would term themselves progressive. A very dangerous precedent.

Second, the use of proxies in the media. Dr. Mani was targeted on the principle of her vulnerability as a foreign woman of south Indian descent. Vide much of the unashamedly xenophobic, racist, sexist and xenophobic media coverage from the usual suspects. If one is to understand this as a well-planned putsch, and I have too much of an estimation for the machinatory abilities of its authors not to, then it would seem that there was a simple division of labour between the self-styled progressives and the chauvinists.

Ravana said,

February 13, 2008 @ 1:30 pm

My usual respect for the author’s intellectual prowess and his contributions to civil society notwithstanding, I found that this article succeeded in amplifying the “sensational and sordid proportions” that it purports to rail against.

It is ambiguous and, worse, insinuative. It leads the reader immediately to the desired and UNFOUNDED conclusion of the first commentator that, “If the recent interview with one of the main protagonists in the past weekend’s The Nation is anything to go by, there is now a conscious attempt to shift the agenda to discussion of altogether more purely “professional” issues – re the financial predicament of the ICES, its internal structure etc…Dr. Sara’s piece has the virtue of reminding us what this all really about. The calling in of the CID and the cancellation of Dr Mani’s visa were not merely collateral.”

Personally, being a friend of Pradeep Jeganathan’s and finding it impossible to reconcile the man I know with the gossipy allegations that are being levelled against him, I thought it was a good thing that he responded to the allegations made against him in Bradman Weerakoon’s interview on the Sunday before. There were few explicit accusations made, and he responded to them, in a very convincing way, I thought.

It is unhelpful to anybody’s understanding of the situation to beat around the bush. And, this article does that.

Jack Point said,

February 13, 2008 @ 1:44 pm

Poor Rama, looks like she got a taste of the local corporate politics as well as that of the paranoia of the political establishment.

dj said,

February 14, 2008 @ 9:04 pm

I agree that it is difficult to PROVE that Jeganathan’s Nation interview was nothing other than an incidental description of the state of the ICES at this particular moment in its history. Perhaps he had nothing better to do, perhaps as Ravana suggests he was merely responding to Bradman Weerakoon’s “gossipy allegations” the week before. Perhaps the placement of an unauthored article below the interview describing the financial crisis at the ICES & R2P as the work of foreigners seeking “vengeance” on GOSL was also merely…placement.

Even setting aside the preceding unauthored articles with unattributed sources spilling the beans on the ICES in the Nation and other papers, I think, to put it charitably, that this would be a fairly basic understanding of how the media works and how it’s used.

I don’t think character attestations are any less “insinuative” than the acknowledgement of what everyone knows; that there is a struggle going on here for control of the ICES, people are making claims on it and its Colombo director has been effectively expelled from Sri Lanka. To read Jeganathan’s interview, one would think that the latter episode was merely epiphenomenal – it doesn’t even warrant a mention. So given that he’s a person, as has been noted in other interviews, who chooses his words carefully, I choose to read this as intentional.

Ravana said,

February 15, 2008 @ 10:46 am

That’s all you’ve got?

eleka said,

February 15, 2008 @ 10:09 pm

I just want to comment that sara’s article points clearly to how vicious people have become in their desire to grab institutional power. This kind of harassment of Mani is also gendered, of harassing a woman by constantly drawing attention to her attractiveness. Furthermore, those involved in trying to grab power at ICES have long been critics of Sinhala nationalism, and claim to value human rights. What has happened proves that they criticize nationalism, but have no compunctions about using a nationalist repressive state for personal gain. The R2P issue is nothing new. ICES has always stood for human rights protection. This is something we have espoused for a long time. It was used as an excuse by petty people for petty gains. What they do not seem to care about is that they are reducing space for discussion and political intervention in Sri Lanka, and in the process shrinking the space they have for themselves.

Sassy said,

February 17, 2008 @ 9:34 pm

Hi, I am really enjoying this discussion and have learnt a lot from following the debate about ICES and R2P in the various newspapers. I have lived in this country for several years now and have gone to many movies and talks at ICES. I am also a great fan of Groundviews which I think is a wonderful forum though I have not felt confident enough, until today, to respond to any of the articles or comments which I read avidly.

Sara is also one of my heros after he fought that lone battle in the courts to stop northern and eastern Tamils from being evicted from Colombo. However, I think Rajiva Wijesinha has a point when he says that some of the positions Sara takes are knee-jerk ones (these are my words not RWs) which are not fully thought out. I think this frequently happens when progressives feel embattled; they become entrenched in their views and often do not even try to find out all the facts before rushing to draw conclusions because they are so sure who the bad guys are. In this regard, I think you guys should not only be discussing the sovereignty of the nation but the sovereignty of NGOs in Sri Lanka because I do think you allow your donors to set the agenda for you far too much. Why do you always have to look for the initiative to be taken by the UN or a Gareth Evans? This is something which would never happen in India because activists there are much more conscious about figuring out issues for themselves by themselves.

And on the issue of Mani’s attractiveness. Have you ever seen her in action at a party, Eleka? Believe me, she is one confident woman who manipulates her beauty to great advantage (in fact, when I first met her, I thought Weerakoon was her doting doddering husband and she was, not surprisingly, looking for younger fodder!) and as someone who has done the same, I don’t see any thing wrong with that. I just don’t cry about it afterwards, I just sock it to them where it hurts!

dujohn said,

February 28, 2008 @ 3:10 pm

Great Article by Dr, P Saravanamuttu. It’s a pity our sinhala speaking brothers and sisters cannot read a translation of this and other articles by the Dr. Someone should translate.

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